The Savior's Hand
by TheAngelsHaveThePhoneBox
Summary: Ryan's had enough, and he wants to go home. But going home will only lead him into his most dangerous adventure yet. A Government science project is tasked with fixing the world, but are actually being manipulated into burning it to cinders. The Doctor must shut the project down before it destroys everything. But will Ryan be fighting with him or against him? Episode 4 in a series.
1. Chapter 1

**(A.N.) It's been a long time since I posted, but I'm kind of temporarily homeless, so there! Long story short, my house is currently unsafe to enter, so I've been staying with relatives all over the place for the last month or two and now I'm in a temporary place of my own while they fix my freaking house. Sucky? Yes. But on the bright side, as excuses for not posting go, that's a pretty good one, right? :D**

**Anyway, enough of my yapping. Here's episode four:**

* * *

There was a blinking red light, and it was going to wipe out life on Earth.

The light was one of many on a control panel in the middle of a large laboratory. The laboratory was filled with many scientists, and was normally a very quiet room, the only sounds usually being the noise of typing, and beeping, and complicated conversations about physics.

Today, however, it was chaos.

There was an alarm sounding over and over. Flashing warning lights and electronic voices repeated dire scenarios in vacant voices. The scientists were rushing about wildly, shouting across one another in between fearfully staring at their computer screens.

Not one of them was looking at the blinking red light, or the machine it was monitoring.

"We can't stabilise it!" cried one of the scientists, looking desperately to the man next to her.

His name was Doctor Edward Wilhelm, and unless someone did something quick, he would be forever immortalised as the man who brought about the end of the world.

Doctor Wilhelm was trying his best to appear calm, though the flashing lights could be seen bouncing off the sweat on his brow. He wiped it off with sleeve of his expensive three-piece-suit - no white coat for him - and continued to type away at his computer.

The sound of the door to the laboratory _whushing_ open caught everyone's attention, and there was an audible sigh of relief when a young red-headed woman entered the room and ran quickly towards Dr Wilhelm.

"What'd I miss?" she asked, in a smooth American accent.

"Blitz, where the hell have you been?" asked Wilhelm furiously. "I called for you four minutes ago, do you have any idea what's happening here?"

The woman - Blitz - waved a vague, apologetic hand. "I was upstairs trying to order a pizza. The only thing worse than the food in this place is the cell phone signal." Wilhelm gave her a look of utter disbelief, so she quickly turned her focus to the screen in front of them. "Ohhh Eddy. That's bad. That's very bad."

"I know," he replied as she elbowed him out of the way and took over control of his keyboard.

"Like, end of days bad."

"I know," Wilhelm repeated in exasperation.

"You said you had defenses to stop this sort of thing," she told him irritably, typing away at breathtakingly high-speeds.

"I do and they're supposed to," said Dr Wilhelm. "But there must've been a glitch and they've stopped running."

"_A glitch?_" Blitz repeated incredulously, never taking her dark green eyes away from the screen. "Everything this thing can do and you left _a glitch_ in it?"

"Never mind that! Can you stop it?"

All the other scientists had stopped now. All eyes were on her. Blitz - the Earth's last hope. The light from the computer screen illuminated her pale, freckled face as she bit her lip in concentration.

In the centre of the room, smoke started to trickle out of the machine that no one was making eye contact with. The red light started to flash at an alarming rate.

Dr Whilhelm turned away from his ashen-faced colleagues, away from the screens given them the statistics surrounding their horrible deaths, away from the machine of his own invention that was attempting to kill them all. He looked instead to the far corner of the room, to a small dome that hung from the ceiling, blacked out but containing a camera.

They were surely watching this, he thought. Why weren't they doing anything?

"Blitz," he begged.

"I know, I know," she said, some desperation starting to edge into her own voice. "Just… give me a minute."

"If we don't do something right now - "

"I said give me a minute!" Blitz snapped.

"We don't have a minute!"

Her emerald eyes flicked across the information pouring across the screen at great speeds that were only outdone by her fingers typing on the keyboard below.

"I can do it!" she said in amazement. "I can diffuse the reaction and reset the system. But there's still gonna be a massive energy discharge." She whipped her head around to look at Whilhelm enquiringly, her auburn ponytail missing his face by inches. "What's next door?"

"Next door? Nothing, we're just using their generators. It's a school, I think."

Blitz smirked and returned to typing.

"Not for long, it isn't," she said.

Meanwhile, next door, there was an envelope with Ryan Murphy's name on it. This envelope contained the results of Mr Murphy's A-level exams, which determined whether or not he would be accepted into University, which Mr Murphy felt would define his entire life.

This envelope, much like the building it inhabited, was about to be blown to pieces.

* * *

**DOCTOR WHO**

**The Saviour's Hand**

* * *

The field was busy that day. August was ending, summer was taking a final bow, and weather reports were already warning of September's oncoming storms. But for now the sun hung high and proud, and people decided to make the best of it. In addition to the usual dog walkers strolling across the freshly cut grass that day, ordinary folk had decided to join them, some using it as a sunny detour to the shops across the way, while others were simply enjoying a relaxing morning trek.

And, of course, there were the students, nervously journeying towards the school at the far end of the field for their exam results.

If any of these walkershad been looking, they would have seen something very peculiar. In a shady corner of the field, two people entered a big blue box, which gradually faded from view. A few seconds later, however, the box returned, exactly where it stood before, and the same two people stepped out of it.

Both of these events took place in the same minute, but the box, and it's passengers, had been across this world and others between takeoff and landing.

"It's the same day?" said Ryan, blocking the sun in his eyes with his hand and gazing across the field.

"Err…" said the Doctor, closing the TARDIS doors behind him, licking his finger and holding it aloft. "Yep. We've been gone about fifty-two seconds."

Ryan looked to the footpath at the other end of the field, where he could spot a few of his fellow students heading into the school, like he had been, to pick up their A-level results. Ryan let out a relieved sigh.

"No offence, but I did have a passing worry you'd end up landing, like, a year after we left or something."

"…Yeah!" the Doctor laughed heartily. "That would be awkward, wouldn't it?"

They then returned to the unbearably awkward silence that had plagued them since Ryan had asked to come home. Neither of them knew where to take the conversation from here, but it was Ryan who eventually spoke first.

"Listen… I'm sorry, Doctor."

The Doctor, who had been absentmindedly drawing patterns in the soil with his boot, looked at him in surprise.

"Sorry for what?"

Ryan shrugged sadly.

"For the way I spoke to you before. I don't blame you, for what happened. And I'm for sorry wasting your time. I know you've probably travelled with a lot of people before me. I'm sorry I wasn't strong like they must have been."

The Doctor looked at him for moment, then laughed.

"Ryan Murphy," he said. "The boy who stood on this field one dark evening, and saved the whole world without taking a single life. Ryan Murphy, who uncovered the lost, alien child that had been unknowingly killing random New York citizens. Ryan Murphy, the boy from Earth who wouldn't leave a compound on an alien world until every stranger that inhabited it was safe, and who stopped an old, silly man from making a very big mistake. And you think you're not strong?"

Ryan shook his head sadly. "It's not about - "

"If you want to leave, Ryan," said the Doctor, "that's your choice, and if you're sure about it then I'll get in my box and I'll fly away. But I will be damned if I leave you thinking that hearing a man murdered and letting it get to you is a sign of weakness."

His words did nothing to ease Ryan's mind. The simple fact was that Ryan had gotten spooked at the first sign of trouble, and begged to come home, a fact which left Ryan feeling pretty ashamed.

"It's not always like that, you know," said the Doctor. "I really don't go looking for trouble. I'm nearly one thousand years old, I worked up a lot of breaths and I like seeing sights that take them away. Like the caterpillar planet! Or the waterfall stuck in a black hole. Or Mario Kart tournaments at Stan Lee's house."

"But they come at a price, don't they?" replied Ryan, that bitter tone from earlier resurfacing. "Because every now and then you get a day like I've just had, don't you? Like the compound, and the Nothing, and the guys who are supposed to be protecting the people instead burning them alive and turning them into monsters."

The Doctor stopped smiling.

"I have the means to help people in situations like that. I can't turn a blind eye."

Ryan sighed, suddenly feeling very tired.

"I'm not asking you to, that's what makes you who you are. And I wish could be that type of person, but I'm not."

The Doctor gave him a stubborn shrug. "I think you are."

"And I'd like to believe that, but look where we are."

They were quiet for a moment, and it wasn't until Ryan realised the Doctor was wondering how he could convince him that he decided to make things final.

"I'm staying," he said, and felt his heart cringe at the look of sadness on the Doctor's face.

"Okay," said the Time Lord, quietly.

He walked forward, gave Ryan an awkward pat on the shoulder and then turned back to the TARDIS, pulling out the key and unlocking the doors.

"Thanks," Ryan had to say, before he stepped inside and flew away forever. "I know it didn't turn out how we thought it would, but… thanks for taking me."

The Doctor gave him the smallest of grins.

"We had some fun, though, didn't we?"

And Ryan couldn't fight his smirk.

"Yeah. Yeah, we did."

The Doctor hovered clumsily for a second, before walking forward again to embrace Ryan in a crushing hug. Ryan laughed and squeezed as good as he got.

"Take care of yourself," said the Doctor, releasing Ryan.

"Take care of _your_self," Ryan replied.

The Doctor beamed at him for a long moment, before taking in a big breath and turning away.

"I'm gonna go before I cry, or kidnap you."

Ryan chuckled again, watching as the Doctor walked to the TARDIS, only to pause again with one foot in the door.

"Listen," he said pleasantly. "I know it's probably very unlikely, but if you ever have any more trouble around here - my kind of trouble - all you have to do is let me kn - "

_Boooom!_

Ryan and the Doctor recoiled in shock, as an explosion at the other end of the field sent a giant fireball flying into the sky.

"You know," said the Doctor, watching Ryan's school become enveloped by flames, "maybe I'll stick around for a bit."

* * *

_End of chapter one._


	2. Chapter 2

**(A.N.) Big thanks for all the reviews, they mean a lot. :) If you'll allow me for a moment to fantasy-cast like I did with Tina Fey as the Mayor back in Episode 3, I'd just like to mention that if you picture Felicia Day when reading Blitz's lines, it will make everything better. Because even if my words fall flat, you're picturing Felicia Day, and she's all kinds of awesome. So win-win, right?**

**Here's chapter two...**

* * *

Ryan had been a good distance away from the actual building that exploded, but he felt as dizzy as if he had been standing right next to it. That was his school. For seven years he'd walked across that field, stepped through the gates and spent nine hours inside. That was the building he made all his friends in. It's where Ashley Campbell fell down the stairs outside the maths room and broke her collarbone. It's where Daniel Jacobs and his gang set off four separate stink bombs in a co-ordinated Halloween prank. It was the building where he first read _Hitchhiker__'__s Guide to the Galaxy_ in an English lesson, never knowing how useful it's tips would prove to be.

It was the building now collapsing in front of his very eyes.

He stood with the crowd of people outside the gates. By some miracle there had been no one inside the school when it erupted. The teachers had been just about to let the twenty or so students who had already arrived through the tall electric gates to pick up their results, when they all been thrown backwards by the blast. The group that had been shaking with excitement was now shaking for an entirely different reason. They all watched the third floor crumble in on itself, become enveloped by flames, and then cease to be a floor at all.

There were sirens approaching at the end of the road, and it was only when he heard them that Ryan realised something. The morning that he'd flown away with the Doctor - _this _morning - he'd been walking to school like everyone else, and he hadn't been alone.

"Craig!" he called out suddenly. "Tom? Adam!"

"Ryan?" came a hoarse voice behind him.

He turned, and breathed a sigh of relief when he saw his three friends - ash and dirt covering parts of their clothes and faces, but still very much alive. He rushed over to them.

"Are you okay?"

"Fine," said Craig, and Ryan realised it was his hoarse voice that had spoken. To hear Craig; cocky and confident and rarely without something to say; speaking like this was surreal. "We'd just got here when… when…"

"I was about to push," said Tom, staring at the gates like they were not of this world. "Nudge past everyone else so I could get in first."

"Ryan, where did you go?" asked Adam, who cradled a sprained elbow against his chest.

How, in any situation let alone the one they were in now, was Ryan supposed to answer that question?

"I…" he stuttered.

"Excuse me, Ryan, can I just borrow you for a second?"

It was the Doctor, who Ryan had completely forgotten about. He placed a hand on Craig's shoulder comfortingly, but motioned for Ryan to follow him. His friends gave him a puzzled look as he and the man they'd never seen before approached the school gates.

"I can't open them," said the Doctor.

"What?"

"The gates," he said. "The sonic won't even budge them."

Ryan searched for the reaction he thought the Doctor was after, but then decided there wasn't one.

"So what?" was his exasperated reply.

The Doctor frowned at him. Clearly Ryan was not as bothered by the sonic's performance issues as he was.

"It's a sonic screwdriver. And those are school gates from Earth. They should open before I've even taken the thing out of my pocket."

"Well maybe it's broken."

"Or maybe someone doesn't want me getting through the gates."

Ryan stared at him in disbelief until it made his eyes hurt, and he rubbed them tiredly.

"…what?" asked the Doctor. "What's wrong."

"What's wrong? That's my school! Those are my friends! My friends have just nearly died because my school exploded. I don't have time to think about people stopping your sonic screwdriver from opening gates."

The Doctor looked around, as if noticing for the first time the people who'd been closest to the blast. They were standing as Ryan had been, gazing at the burning building in horror. There were people still too shaken to stand, others clinging to one another in despair as ambulances and fire engines arrived at the scene.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly. "I didn't mean to - "

"No, I'm sorry," said Ryan. It seemed his emotional reflex lately was to blame everything on the Doctor, and he knew that wasn't fair. "I'm just… I'm still exhausted from what happened in the compound. And now this, it's all - "

There was a metal _clang_ and the gates started to slowly pull themselves open. The sonic had finally found a way through, and now Ryan and the Doctor were looking at the open entryway, across the schoolyard and up to the still crumbling shell that had been his school.

"That could very well have been a gas explosion," said the Doctor. "Or an electrical fire that triggered a gas explosion, or any number of perfectly innocent reasons. But those gates should have opened five minutes ago, Ryan, and they didn't. These are the things I notice, and I can't ignore them."

Ryan, of course, knew what the Doctor wanted to do. He wanted to run across that field and burst into the building. He wanted to search the whole area, leave no stone un-sonic-ed, until he found some semblance of proof to back up his suspicions of foul play. And, while he would certainly want to bring the perpetrators (if there were any) to justice, the most important thing to the Doctor, the thing that his unbelievable impossible brain just always needed to know, was why? Why did this school blow up? Why here, why now? All of his adventures were fascinating stories, and he was always racing to the end so he could connect all the dots.

The Doctor was running across the schoolyard. No question about it. The only thing in question, was whether Ryan would run with him.

Then he heard her.

"Ryan? Ryan? Craig! Oh, boys, you're alright! Where's Ryan?"

He stared at his mother like he hadn't seen her for decades. She saw him and sobbed, and he was by her side instantly.

"We heard the noise of it!" she said through tears. "It shook the kitchen windows, I thought you were…"

"Mum, I'm fine," he told her, allowing her to wrap him up in a hug that rivaled the bone-crushing squeeze of the Doctor's.

"Ryan," said his dad, standing beside his mum and looking pale as a ghost. "What was it, son?"

"I don't know, I didn't really see."

Other parents had appeared now, enveloping their children as Policemen tried to move everyone away from the school.

"Let's get you home," said his mum, putting an arm around his shoulders and pulling him away.

"Karen, maybe the Paramedics should look him over," said his dad.

They argued. Ryan stopped listening. He turned back as his Mum led him away. The smoke from the explosion had crossed the schoolyard, and now a thick black cloud was drifting out of the open gates. But even through the cloud, Ryan could see that the Doctor was gone.

* * *

They didn't look her in the eye, Blitz noticed. This laboratory was staffed only by the most brilliant minds in their respective fields. The men and women in white coats had Masters, PhDs, and degrees the general public weren't even aware of. And yet every single one of them was painfully intimidated by the twenty-four year old American in the corner, who was smarter than all thirty of them put together yet had never finished high school.

This tickled Blitz.

"Excuse me," she said, stopping a passing scientist who had been pretending to stare at notes on his iPad while risking glances in her direction. But now, he was forced to look at her, leant back in her chair with her sneaker-clad feet resting on the desk (the desk that was not so subtly placed in the top corner of the lab, a good five feet away from everyone else). "Hi!" she said brightly. "Listen, do you know how to get a charged particle to accelerate at the speed of light?"

"Uhh," said the scientist awkwardly. He prodded and poked at his iPad screen like it would help him in some way. Blitz couldn't contain herself any longer, and giggled.

"Lol, I'm just kidding, I worked that out when I was thirteen. Yeah, I say 'lol' out loud, what of it? Keep walking!"

The scientist scurried back to his desk like a mouse, and Blitz watched him with intense delight.

"Ah, the British," she sang to herself.

"Are we planning on working today?" came the voice of Dr Wilhelm, and he appeared from behind her, rifling through a stack of papers he carried in his arms.

"You mean apart from fixing your little technical hitch and saving every life on this planet? Nah, I think I've filled my quota for the day."

Wilhelm sighed and put the papers away. He pulled out a pair of thick-rimmed glasses and placed them on his face to look at her.

"Blitz, I'm beginning to think you're not 100% committed to this project."

Blitz grinned. "You wanna hear what I think you're a 100% of?"

Doctor Wilhelm's expression turned from weary to severe.

"Miss Gregory - " (Blitz scowled at the mention of her real name, as intended.) "You are a brilliant young mind. You are gifted and creative, and more intelligent than I think you even know. But you are also lazy, ill-mannered, and pointlessly rebellious."

Blitz dropped her feet off the desk and sat up straight in her chair.

"I'm also the chick who stopped the world ending today," she said pointedly. "Technically, that makes me a superhero, and it kind of gives me the right to a five minute break."

She pulled her chair in and opened up her laptop, declaring the conversation over.

Wilhelm studied her for a moment. He sighed again, and seemingly gave up as he started to walk away. But after only a few steps, he stopped. He looked at her over his shoulder; super-serious and entirely more dramatic than the situation called for.

"We're part of something special here, Blitz," he told her. "Every person in this room is going to be remembered for years to come. Talked about. So watch how you're perceived, because generations to come will perceive you the exact same way. We're going to change - "

"Just one second, Doc," replied Blitz, holding up a finger and pulling her blackberry out of her pocket. She dialed a number, and the staff phone on her desk began to ring. Wilhelm was already storming away sullenly when she picked it up and began a conversation with herself. "Hello? Sorry, Doc, gotta take this. Why yes I have just been given a boring speech! However did you know?"

* * *

_End of Chapter Two_


	3. Chapter 3

**(A.N.) Long wait, I know. But my fanfiction focus was shifted on a little Doctor Who Christmas story that I never ended up finishing/posting. Anyway, the Christmas special hit me with a big burst of _Who_-inspiration, so on we go!**

* * *

One of these days, the Doctor was really going to have to remember which of Jupiter'smoons that street market had been on so he could vigorously thank the three-eared fellow who had sold him what he had referred to as Trickster Parchment, and the Doctor had quickly renamed Psychic Paper.

It was this most marvellous of inventions that allowed the Doctor - a man dressed in a bow tie, braces and tweed - to claim to be a member of the Fire Brigade and have actual members of the Fire Brigade believe him. In turn, this was how the Doctor was able to wander the smoky ruins of Ryan's school, while firemen finished putting out the last stubborn flames that clung to rubble. He was able to listen in on conversations between the firemen, who remarked on how this fire was very strange, and early examinations were not characteristics of a gas explosion. If that was true, they asked, then what in god's name would cause a school to explode so massively?

The Doctor wondered this also.

He started to speculate, build theories upon theories then stack them all up next to each other to run through with that speed-of-light brain of his. But then he heard something else that made him stop. One of the Firemen had asked if anyone had been to the small office building next door to check if everyone was alright.

"I'll go do it," said the Doctor.

The Firemen looked at him in surprise, not seeing him sneak up behind them and eavesdrop on their discussion.

"Who are you," said one of them crossly, looking at the Doctor's attire. "Are you supposed to be here?"

The Doctor merely smiled, and reached inside his pocket again for that oh so wonderful black wallet of his.

* * *

It was a strange feeling of nostalgia that overcame Ryan, as he stepped through his front door and into the hallway of his house.

Though it was true that keeping track of time whilst travelling through it was easier said than done, Ryan reckoned he'd been in the TARDIS for no more than three days. But in the three days since they had stood in this hallway, his feet had touched down in places he'd never dreamed they would. They had strolled along the streets of Manhattan and then almost seen them destroyed. They'd walked across alien soil that could have gave out under him at a moment's notice. And they had ran. Oh, boy, how his feet had ran like they had never ran before. So, maybe it had only been three days since he'd stood in this hall, but his feet had been beyond the stars and back since then.

"You go upstairs love," said his mum, as she and his dad entered the house behind him. "Get yourself cleaned up."

Ryan nodded. He waited a few seconds, then said gently, "Mum, I can't really do that if you don't let go of me."

His Mum released the protective grip she'd had latched onto his shoulder, and he walked up the stairs to his bathroom.

Ryan was in the shower when it hit him. This dirt, these bits of soil being washed off of his face and out of his hair right now, they weren't from the field by his house. They were from Cantare, and from the compound. A horribly burnt-brown spec was stuck to his wrist, and he realised it was probably a piece of scabby skin from one of the Nothing.

He clenched his eyes shut and tried to will the image of the bloody-eyed zombies running towards him out of his mind. He focused on the sound of the water raining down on him instead of the memory of their howling screams. Evetually, he realised he'd been standing in the shower for close to twenty minutes, completely still and with hands covering his face.

He got out and dried himself, leaving his clothes in a pile on the bathroom floor where he hoped his mother would throw them away so he'd never have to lay eyes on them ever again. He dressed himself in warm, clean clothes, and collapsed face first into his bed, where he was asleep within minutes.

* * *

The building the firemen spoke of, a small, one storey office complex that was adjacent to the back of Ryan's school, was unharmed. Just out of range from the blast. Not a scratch or even a shattered window. The building was completely fine.

"Too fine," said the Doctor, standing outside of the offices and staring at it intently. Then he heard himself and sighed. "Did I just say 'too fine'? Ugh!"

Still, the point stood. There was something all together fishy about this building. Not to anyone else's mind, of course. To anyone else it was a nameless, faceless, office building. But to the Doctor, it was a giant red flag. A glaring alarm bell. A structure whose every brick set off his spidey-sense.

He reached into his jacket, retrieved the Psychic Paper for the third time today, and started approaching the front door. There was a desk in the front room, and through the large windows that panelled the entrance he could see a mild-mannered receptionist sitting behind it, a man who would no doubt have waived him through into the building without a second glance at the black wallet.

But then the Doctor stopped, because someone else had appeared. A young woman had poked her fiery red-haired head out the doors behind the receptionist desk, spoken loudly and concisely to the receptionist, then disappeared back the way she had came.

The Doctor cocked an eyebrow.

"Well, well, well," he murmured. "Fancy meeting you here, Miss Blitz."

* * *

_The bloody eyes of a Nothing locked on to his. A decaying hand clawed out for his face and__…_

Ryan woke up with a start. He sat up straight in bed, heart thundering beneath his chest.

"Dream," Ryan told himself. "Bad dream."

The thought that nightmares from his time in the TARDIS might be a regular night time guest from now on briefly came to him, but he quickly stood up in search of something to distract from it. Something fun, he decided. Something he liked. He looked around him, at the average bedroom most seventeen year old boys would have. Books, comics, DVDs, videogames. He walked to his shelf and flicked through them. A game he had loved, about a time cop at war with aliens, caught his eye. Ryan had actually travelled in time, now. He'd fought aliens. The game probably wouldn't be much fun anymore.

He turned away with a tinge of frustration, and in doing so he noticed something else. On the other side of his room was his desk, which housed his computer and, more importantly, a small piece of paper. Ryan, of course, knew exactly what that piece of paper was, yet he still crossed the room and picked it up.

It was the note that the Doctor had left for them on the morning after the night they had first met. Ryan, at the time assuming he'd never see the Time Lord again, had kept it. In the six weeks between that morning and the day he flew away, he'd read it many times. Marvelled at what an experience he'd lived through. Longed to meet this magic man again, so as to properly thank him, for everything the Doctor had done.

He scrunched up the piece of paper and threw it into the waste basket. Since that night, 'everything the Doctor had done' included stuff he was not to be thanked for.

* * *

That tiny, one floored office building had an elevator. This elevator travelled ten feet underground to a narrow hallway. At the end of this hallway was a blank, non-descript door. On the other side of this door, was the most secret and technologically advanced government-run laboratory that planet Earth had ever seen.

It was shaped like half a theatre, with one half covered in black reflective tiles that curved around to meet in a wall, as though the whole room was to be looking in this direction at all times. The curved part of the room housed the work stations. Six tiers of levels like rows of an audience, desks and computers all focused forwards. On the floor level was a raised platform; a stage, almost. And the star of the show, was a machine. A very, very, powerful machine.

Also on the floor level was a door that led to an office. This office belonged to Edward Whilhelm. He was the reason everyone was here, the whole project was his baby, and so it was only natural for him to be as close as possible to it at all times.

Inside his office, sitting behind his desk, Edward nodded nervously to no one.

"I'm aware of this," he said.

There was no audible reply, and yet Edward continued to nod.

"As I've already said, we've taken care of it. You don't have to worry so much, I -"

He flinched quite suddenly, like he'd been whipped across the face.

"I understand," he said. "I'll be more careful in future, I promise." He sat still for a few seconds, listening. "Hello? Are you still there?"

There was, as there had been the entire time, silence. Edward sighed, holding a hand to his chest to quell his pounding heart.

"Hey, boss," came Blitz's chirpy voice. She stepped halfway through the door and caught sight of Wilhelm rushing to compose himself. "You okay?"

"What have I said about knocking, Blitz?"

"I'm sorry, I just… you sure you're alright?"

Wilhelm straightened his tie. "I'm fine."

"Have our, er, lord and masters been in touch about your little glitch?"

Wilhelm could only stare dumbly at her.

"Our… our lord and masters?"

Blitz frowned. "The government," she clarified.

Wilhelm sighed again, this time with great relief. "Yes, they've been in touch. They understood. No one was inside, no one was hurt, they can make it look like an accident."

Blitz nodded, still looking at Wilhelm weirdly. "Right. So, back to work then?"

"Back to work," he confirmed.

Blitz closed the door behind her with a furrowed brow. But this expression soon fell away, just as soon as she turned around, and her eyes landed on the machine. The machine that seemed to continually startle you even on the hundredth occasion you looked at it. The machine that made you feel sick; and though you told yourself you didn't, you knew exactly why this was. Because of what it could do.

As Blitz climbed the steps of the different levels of workstations, she did not see the man watching her from the other side of the room.

A ordinary, one storey office building that happened to have a top-secret government base hidden beneath it. The Doctor smiled. He had hit the jack-pot.

* * *

_End of Chapter Three._


	4. Chapter 4

**(A.N.) I go missing for months at a time then randomly reappear, bringing with me time travel, monsters and adventure. So yeah, I'm basically the Doctor now. :)**

* * *

Everyone in the laboratory was so busy that the Doctor was able to move about freely. He strolled from desk to another, peering over scientist with keen interest at the what they worked on.

With a quick glance to the top corner of the room, where Blitz continued to be thankfully unaware of his presence, he chose a desk at random. A young woman in a white coat typed away at her computer, having to tear her eyes away from the screen when the Doctor greeted her.

"Hi, so sorry to interrupt," he said pleasantly. "Thingy wants to see you." The woman stared blankly back at him. "Oh, you know. What's his name? Bah! I'm drawing a blank, don't you hate it when that happens? You know who I mean… the big boss!"

"Dr Wilhelm?" the woman offered.

"Yes! Sorry, long day, you know how it is in this place." (He was quietly pleased to see the woman smile in understanding.) "Anyway, I just got asked to pass the message along. Your presence is required. Don't worry, you're not in trouble or anything, just a chat."

The woman gathered up her papers and set off down the stairs. The Doctor waited until she was a good distance away, then sat down in her chair and pulled her keyboard towards him.

* * *

Ryan had sat in his room for a long time, searching for something to occupy his restless mind. But it wasn't until he went back downstairs, where his mother and father watched news report on the explosion, that his spirits perked up.

"Have they said anything?" he asked, rushing into the room.

His dad shook his head. "It doesn't seem like they know any more than we do."

"Well I'll want answers," said his Mum sternly. "Two minutes more and all of our kids would have been up with that school. They should have been checking their gas or electrics or whatever it was caused it."

Ryan frowned. "Thing is though, you hear about gas or electric explosions all the time on the news. They never seem to have trouble identifying them. Why don't we know what caused this one yet?"

From the couch he stood next to, Jack and Karen Murphy shared a bemused look, then laughed.

"Get on the case, then, Sherlock," said his Dad.

Ryan thought for a second, then had to laugh as well. "Sorry, yeah, what am I on about? God, I'm even starting to talk like him."

"Who?" asked Karen.

"Hmm?"

"Staring to talk like who, love?"

"Oh," said Ryan quickly. "No one."

A look of worry crossed his mother's face, and she stood up to look at him.

"It's been a bit of mad day, hasn't it?"

Ryan caught her implication and shrugged evasively. "I'm fine, Mum, honestly."

"It's alright love," she insisted. "We understand. Look, I'll tell you what, I'll get right on the phone to them teachers and see how long it will take for them to find out what your A-level results were. That will put your mind at ease, won't it?"

She smiled lovingly then went off to the kitchen carrying the phone. Ryan gaped at his father.

"Is she for real?" he asked. "Inches from being blown to smithereens and she thinks I'm upset because I don't know if I passed Business Studies?"

His Dad gave him a knowing smile and a shrug. "You know what she's like."

Ryan shook his head in wonder, sitting down next to Jack where his Mum had just been.

"Hey," said his Dad seriously. "Look at me." Ryan did. "Are you alright? Properly, though? And don't just tell me you are like you'd say to your Mum so she didn't worry. Tell me really."

The first instinct was to give the same nod, shrug and false smile he'd been giving all day. But for some reason Ryan found himself sighing deeply instead.

"Not really," he said.

Jack turned off the TV with the remote. "Talk to me."

And Ryan realised the explosion would be a perfect opportunity to tell his Dad about the turmoil his brain had been subjected to, without going into the rather curious details about time machines and alien planets.

"I feel like I can't sit still. Like things have changed in between when I left the house this morning and when I came home. After what's happened, to just sit in my room with games, and the internet and stuff, just all seems… I don't know. Pointless, I suppose."

"Why do you say that?" asked Jack.

"Because of what I've seen. Real life things. Death. Or," he added quickly, "close to it. I mean, any one of us could have been killed if we were any closer to that school." His seemed non-fazed by his slip up, so he carried on. "And maybe this is stupid, but I can't stop thinking I've been left with a choice. I can go back to the way things were yesterday, try and ignore that I know now that stuff like this happens all the time without me realising. Or…"

His voice trailed off, and he looked up to see his Dad listening intently, concerned.

"It's hard to explain."

His Dad nodded. "Just try."

Ryan ran frustrated hand through his hair and tried to find the words to explain without _really_ explaining. "You know how you see things on TV sometimes, like documentaries about people who do these amazing things? And you say, 'That's brilliant. What that person does with their life is completely brilliant, and now I'm going to try and be like that too'. But even when you say that, really underneath you know you never could. Because some people just have the right stuff inside of them to that and some don't. There's the people that have documentaries made about them, and there's the people who watch."

"This," said Jack carefully, "is about more than the explosion, isn't it?" Ryan's face fell, and he wondered how he'd possibly gave the truth away. "It's University, isn't it? And your Mum?"

Ryan, strangely, didn't know whether to feel disappointed or relieved.

"I'm just tired," he said, standing up.

Jack studied him worriedly, and looked about to say something, when Karen's voice drifted in from the kitchen.

"Clean up operations? What about my son's education? I think you need to get your priorities in order!"

Ryan rolled his eyes. "I need a walk."

* * *

The intention had been to spend two minutes, no more, at the young woman's computer. To scroll through two or three articles to get a working knowledge of what was taking place in this super-secret underground laboratory.

The Doctor had forgotten this intention six or seven minutes ago.

He had kept scrolling, he had kept reading, he had gazed at the screen with an open jaw at the absolute horror of it all. Because inside this underground laboratory, human beings were playing with fire. They were dealing with forces a long, long way beyond their control.

He heard footsteps and looked up, the woman whose desk this belonged to was climbing the stairs with a ticked off expression. The Doctor quickly stood from his chair and moved away. He moved down a level, away from the woman and further away from Blitz's line of sight. Here, he hovered on the spot for a few seconds, looking at all the scientists at their desks, probably keystrokes away from killing billions. Then his eyes fell upon the source of this madness, and he decided to stop hovering. He made his way down the steps, and approached the machine.

* * *

Where Ryan thought he'd been walking to, he wasn't sure. Yet somehow he'd ended up on the road that used to have a school at the end of it, but now had two police officers standing in front of 'DO NOT ENTER' tape, stopping anyone from entering the smoky remains. The other side of the tape was a hectic scene. The schoolyard was filled with officers and firefighters, still assessing the damage and searching for explanations.

Ryan watched this for a while, and then had to turn away. The sadness he felt at the sight of his destroyed school kept being nudged out of his head by a small voice which quietly speculated on the events that led up to the explosion.

_Shut up_, Ryan told himself. His days of solving mysteries were over. Uncontrollable curiosity was a trait of the Doctors, and the reason he'd given that sort of thing up was because he didn't have it in him.

_Ah,_ said the little voice, _then why are you still doing it?_

* * *

If it were placed among the computer terminals that lined every level of this lab, the Doctor would have walked past the machine without a second glance. The fact that it was placed on a plinth in the forefront of the giant room was it's only defining characteristic; apart from that it looked like any old boring workplace appliance.

Not much bigger than an photocopier, it was made out a dull, beige painted metal, with various vents and fan openings placed strategically around it. There were a few buttons and little square lights on the top, but none of these were labelled, and so were just as boring as the rest of it.

As he walked towards this entirely mundane-looking machine, the Doctor thought about the information he'd just read, which also made it the most dangerous machine on the planet. And the Doctor had the slightest twinge of suspicion that these two facts were not coincidental.

Now standing in front of the machine, he cast a wary glance behind him. Fortunately, the scientists on the levels above were too engrossed in their work to notice a stranger climbing the steps and standing on the plinth, so he had no qualms about producing his sonic screwdriver.

He pointed the device at the machine... but did not press the button. Again, from what he'd just read, the science behind this thing was sketchy at best. A simple scan from the sonic could, potentially, have unwanted effects.

The Doctor ignored these worries. He pressed his button. The green light of the sonic lit up and pulled in readings from the machine. It did not blow up the Doctor's face, and so he breathed normally again. He had just flicked his screwdriver out to look at it's results, when his eyes noticed something. There had been a static green light on the top of the machine, only now it had started to blink, and had also turned red.

"Oops," said the Doctor.

* * *

Ryan, eager to distract himself from that silly voice in his head, walked down the little footpath that led away from the school and onto the field. He'd rather not go home right now, what with his mother mourning the loss of his a-level results and his dad's well-meaning but not-quite-understanding concern.

Instead, Ryan made his way to where all of this had started, the patch of grass that used to house Crazy Harry's hut. The TARDIS still stood a few feet away, and Ryan looked at with warring emotions.

He'd already made his choice. He'd told the Doctor on this very field just a few hours ago that he did not want to travel with him any longer, that he wasn't made of the right stuff, and that he wanted to return home to a normal life. So why exactly did he feel so conflicted? Why did he feel like he was making a huge mistake, or passing up the chance of a lifetime?

The image from the TARDIS doors as it hung in space came to him. The sight of that endless expanse of stars, each holding a different adventure, waiting patiently. Then Ryan saw the bloody eyes of the Nothing again, screaming at the top of their shredded lungs and ripping a man's body apart in front of him.

He shivered. The voice in his head had gone quiet. Putting positive spin on the Nothing was impossible. If you wanted to go on breath taking adventures with the Doctor in time and space, you needed to be ready to live through the terrible ones, too. And every time Ryan thought about being stuck in that compound he…

His train of thought disappeared. There was smoke coming from the wreck of the school behind the trees. But not a huge, mass cloud; if so Ryan would have assumed it was simply left over from the explosion. No, this was a single spire of ominous black smoke, steadily rising into the air.

Without thinking, Ryan was running. He ran towards the trees so he could peek behind them, through the fencing that used to surround the school. The smoke was coming from one particular crack in the destroyed foundations of the building. And not one of the dozens of police officers and firefighters inspecting the wreckage had noticed it.

Ryan looked back at the smoking crack. The broken concrete around it was trembling. The crack was getting bigger.

Ryan whipped around to look towards the TARDIS. If he had to guess between the time machine and the source of the black smoke, Ryan was fairly confident where the Time Lord would be found.

"Doctor," he said sternly. "What the hell are you playing at?"

* * *

_End of Chapter Four._


End file.
